Dread Nation (Dread Nation #1) by Justina Ireland

There have been quite a few new releases in the YA genre over the last year that are consistently making me eat my words! I said that I don't enjoy YA as a general rule, but these Black authors are making me happily read YA books. The absolute best thing for me about these books are that they don't 'feel' like YA books. They are dealing with themes that readers like myself can easily relate to and enjoy. Justina Ireland's Dread Nation is yet another YA book that I will be diving into soon! The cover, the trailer, and the general premise of the book are checking all of my boxes! Check out the trailer below, you'll be intrigued too!

(Trailer via Epic Reads)

Dread Nation

Jane McKeene was born two days before the dead began to walk the battlefields of Gettysburg and Chancellorsville—derailing the War Between the States and changing America forever. In this new nation, safety for all depends on the work of a few, and laws like the Native and Negro Reeducation Act require certain children attend combat schools to learn to put down the dead. But there are also opportunities—and Jane is studying to become an Attendant, trained in both weaponry and etiquette to protect the well-to-do. It’s a chance for a better life for Negro girls like Jane. After all, not even being the daughter of a wealthy white Southern woman could save her from society’s expectations.

But that’s not a life Jane wants. Almost finished with her education at Miss Preston’s School of Combat in Baltimore, Jane is set on returning to her Kentucky home and doesn’t pay much mind to the politics of the eastern cities, with their talk of returning America to the glory of its days before the dead rose. But when families around Baltimore County begin to go missing, Jane is caught in the middle of a conspiracy, one that finds her in a desperate fight for her life against some powerful enemies. And the restless dead, it would seem, are the least of her problems.